


Snowflakes

by lonelywalker



Category: Dexter (TV)
Genre: AU, Age Difference, Anniversary, Christmas, F/M, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-10
Updated: 2011-12-10
Packaged: 2017-10-27 04:08:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/291464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelywalker/pseuds/lonelywalker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Deb and Lundy go skiing for their anniversary, but Frank has more than the snow on his mind...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snowflakes

**Author's Note:**

> For kavinskyout.

He was right. She does look great in a parka.

It’s been over a year since the Bay Harbor Butcher died in a fiery explosion in the Everglades, and exactly a year since Debra, despite her utter loathing for quiet, calm, and cold, spent two weeks enduring all three with him on a frozen lake in Canada.

Honestly, they hadn’t caught many fish.

He’d assumed that vacation would be one last hurrah for them and their little homicide investigation romance. Up there in the middle of nowhere, their phones switched off in the bottom of a suitcase, how could she help but realize what he was? An old man, and a boring one without a serial killer to investigate or the thrill of the chase. He’d simply resigned himself to a few days of smiles and relaxation and great sex, and then the inevitable confession from her that, no, maybe this really was never meant to last.

But the days had gone by, all sharp sunlight and brisk winds, and she’d smiled and stayed. She’d snuggled up in his arms by the lake, kissed his breath away when a small town waitress had mistaken him for her father, and, on the last day, said “I love you” and “we fucking well _are_ going to make this work.”

After three months and one last case, he’d filed the last of his paperwork for the Bureau, sold his old family home, and moved in with her in Miami.

Things have been good, even though her job is stressful and he can’t say he doesn’t miss it. At nights sometimes they look at the files together, but mostly he cooks and she eats and they do something boring and domestic like grocery shopping or watching old movies on cable.

It’s wonderful, and he’s terrified.

For their one year anniversary, more or less, Deb gets some vacation time and buys tickets to Vermont. “They have snow there,” she says, rummaging in boxes for her parka and tuque. “You can teach me how to ski.”

“You… want to learn how to ski?” Once he’d thought he knew everything about her just by reading her file. Then he’d assumed everything was clear when they’d started sleeping together. Now, after a year, even the FBI’s best ever profiler has resigned himself to being blindsided at every turn.

She only looks around enough to let him see her grin. “Fuck, Frank,” she says with a hint of glee, “better than _falling_ down the fucking mountain.”

Once on a lonely park bench, before she’d kissed him for the very first time, she’d confessed how much he managed to ground her, to evoke peace from her chaos, to make her feel safe after all she’d suffered at the hands of the Ice Truck Killer. Now, more and more, he finds that he’s the thankful one. A lifetime of travel, never staying in one place for more than a month or two, had led to most of that quiet reserve Deb so admires. But in the years after Connie died, there had been precious little to lift him out of his own introspection. He might give her peace, but she gives him joy.

Deb’s no natural on the slopes, having absolutely refused to start out with the little kids on level ground. He has to admire her energy, though: both the way she continually picks herself up, and the enthusiasm with which she hurls curses at the packed snow (and occasionally other skiers).

“Fucking hunk of fucking icy _shit_ ,” she mutters darkly over hot chocolate. “I think the Morgans must’ve moved to Florida to fucking get _away_ from this stuff.”

“No mountaineering genes?”

“Nope. Long line of sunbathers.” Deb tugs off her gloves and flexes her fingers before warming them on her steaming mug. “So what’s on your mind? We’re supposed to be on vacation, and you’ve barely said a word.” She leans in close with a smirk. “Be honest, baby, did you really want to go to the Bahamas?”

“You can see right through me. I just love it when I turn that _adorable_ shade of lobster pink,” he says drily as he wonders whether he can lie to her, and if he really even wants to. “I was only… thinking about our anniversary.”

“I know! A _year_. Man.” Deb plops her tuque on the table between them, smoothing back her damp hair. “You know, maybe we should call it a day and go back to the hotel room… Cause, you know, that is one fuckin’ fantastic bed.”

It is just utterly impossible to maintain a negative train of thought around her. “Yes,” he agrees. “Yes, it really is.”

“But you’re going to tell me what’s been bugging you first.”

“I am?”

“You are. I’m a detective now. They showed me how to use the thumbscrews.”

He takes a breath. “I… I was a little concerned that, after a year, you might be disappointed if I didn’t…” This had seemed a lot more fluent in his head. “I mean, I love you, Debra. I want to be with you for as long as you’ll have me. But I was married for about as long as you’ve been alive, and I’m just…”

Her eyes are narrowed. “Frank Lundy, are you trying to apologize for not proposing to me?”

Oh thank god. “Well…” It certainly feels better to get it off his chest. “In my defense, I haven’t dated in thirty years.”

“Uh huh. Look, the last guy who proposed to me? Kind of turned out to be a serial killer and tried to kill me. So if you’d started flashing diamond rings around I might’ve tried to kill _you_.” Deb swooshes the hot chocolate around her mug. “So thanks.”

“Um.” He frowns. “You’re welcome?”

There’s a moment of silence, and then she looks up at him, eyes wide: “I mean, I’m not saying _never_ propose…”

“Oh, I’m not saying never either…” Frank says quickly.

“Just… “

“I know.”

“Yeah…”

Everything is so much simpler with his eyes closed as an almost unbelievably hot shower returns a little feeling to his limbs. Deb is busy counting bruises on her shins by the time he’s done, their clothing stacked in a very wet pile by the door.

“I fucking told you those boots didn’t fit right,” she says.

“You need to eat more.” He checks out the mini bar. Only peanuts and various bottles of vodka and whiskey. He takes the whiskey.

“Yeah, cause the weight goes _straight_ to my ankles. Pour me one too.”

She needs a shower as well, but she snuggles up with him under the blankets once they’ve demolished the scotch, his body warming hers.

“You’d really stay with me?” she mutters into his chest. “Forever?”

“Of course I would.”

“I mean… _me_?” She twists around to see his eyes. “You know who I am, right? Debra Morgan, destroyer of worlds…”

He can’t help but laugh. “You’re beautiful. But you can’t keep ignoring the fact that, however good things are, I’m still thirty years older than you. I’m not getting any prettier, or healthier…”

“Bullshit. I’ll be using a walker before you are. Fucking skis.” Her toes are like ice on his calf. “You’ve got to get it through your head that I’m _not_ the one who’s going to leave. Fuck _old_. Fuck _boring_. I spend ten hours a day about to get shot in the head. You’re exactly what I need. What I want.”

All he wants is hold her and never say another word. But… “You might not feel that way in a few years. When you meet a hot guy your own age. When you want kids…”

“Jesus fuck, I _should’ve_ brought my gun.” She pokes him hard in the ribs. “I don’t want kids. I want you. And you’re the hottest guy I’ve ever met who _hasn’t_ also been a complete whackjob, so basically if I’m marrying anyone, ever, I’m marrying you. Even if you’re eighty-five and senile. Got it?”

He’s about to smile and tell her yes, but she’s kissing him instead of waiting for an answer. If he’s taught her half as well as he thinks, she probably doesn’t even need one.

“I love you,” she says, hands cool on his cheeks. “Now I really need a bigger drink. C’mon. We can build a snowman on the way.”

It’s still freezing outside, with a fresh wave of snow blowing in from the north, but he has dry clothes, her hand is grasped tight in his, and, despite all his many doubts and reservations, he now knows that he’s been right all along.

She does look great in a parka.


End file.
